Section in the SSM that is freaking me out

[Young at Heart]

I don't think you are going to like what you will hear in this forum.

I have been in a marriage for over 38 years to a woman I love dearly. It is an SSM. There are many others within this forum who are even more sex starved than I was/am. Most are struggling to feel loved and retain their marriages.

I came to the conclusion last August that I was decieving myself, because each day, each year, for the past 30 years I have told myself that once my wife get more free time, she will invest some of it in the sexual part of our relationship. She has promised this to me over the past 30 years. She was too busy, too tired, in too much pain, etc. I finally realized that it would never happen on its own. I "toughed it out" and "hung in there" through two children growing up, through her parents needing care and ultimately dying, through her mourning the loss of her partents, through her mourning out two children leaving home and starting their own lives as adults, through her getting a graduate degree. There was never any time from her perspective to build and focus on our marriage. I started to say to myself, that if I can just wait until she retires, that she will do the things she has promised me for the last 40+years and spend the time with me that I need. I realized that I would die, before that would happen. That was not a pretty moment. The sexual rejection by my wife got too frequent and too personal. Marriage just hurt. I needed to stop the pain and hurt.

Even though I was sex started, I stopped having sex with my wife. That lasted for over five months until she realized that we were headed for divorce very soon. During that time, I learned a lot and worked hard at changing myself and figuring out how to make my wife "feel loved" even is she wasn't making me "feel loved." I felt that I owed her at least that much and that I should try to save our marriage. In the process I learned that I was a big part of the problem in the way that I had been treating her. That she had felt that I had not given her what she needed and had withdrawn from me as a way of protecting her emotions. I also learned to forgive her and put aside the years of pain and suffering on my part.

We have been with a sex therapist who has gotten us back to having sex again, but I am still unsure if I will divorce my wife or not. She is making huge progress in her ability to understand my needs, but she still is unable to provide me with what I need freely.

I will never decieve myself again into falsely thinking that our relationship will provide for my basic needs. She now has to make our marriage (all aspects of it) a priority, or I will divorce her and find someone who can provide me with what I need. I have told her this and she now believes it and is scared. She doesn't know if she can change or not. I have told her that I will support her if she wants to change, but I will not try to change her, that is totally up to her; as is if our marriage will continue past this year. I have also shared with her my deadline for changing my life, which includes gaining sexual happiness. I am working as fast as I can to change those things in my life that I have control over to become truly happy as a complete man.

I will always love my wife, who is the mother our two wonderful children. But if she can not find the time in her busy life to love me in a way that makes me feel loved, I will no longer decieve myself into thinking that such an arrangement is a healthy marriage.

I understand you pain and fear.......but I also feel your husbands pain and suffering more. The book SSM has much good advice in it for both the LD and HD partner. You are lucky he has shared his feelings with you as you still have a chance to salvage your marriage. I wish you and your husband good luck in saving your marriage, but it will take a husband/wife team to make it better.